The implementation of the Shari’a
and the institutionalization of gender inequality in the aftermath of the
revolution led to the disillusionment of the gender-sensitive Islamist women and
triggered their discontent. Through their involvement in politics they attempted
to present a different reading of Islam and Islamic laws which would be more
attentive to the condition of women. These endeavours failed, however, because
on the one hand they were still largely based on traditionalist interpretations,
and on the other hand, the condition of women did not constitute a priority for
the political and religious elite during the Iraq-Iran War (1980-88). The end of
the war and the implementation of ‘Reconstruction Policies’ provided an
opportunity for a new generation of gender-conscious Islamist women to seek
allies among secular women, to present a modern reading of Islam, and make
radical demands for change in women’s status by using politics as a potent
agent. This article, which is largely based on personal interviews with some of
these vocal women, traces their aspirations and endeavours, their identity
formation, and the outcomes of their
mobilization.

Introduction

What is the difference
between the presidency of the Republic and the management of a government
service? None. Both positions involve responsibilities in the executive branch.
Therefore, why should a woman not lead the country when she can legitimately be
at the head of a government service?[1] Faizeh Rafsanjani,
the President of the Islamic Countries’ Sports Solidarity Council, and the
younger daughter of the President of the Islamic Republic, gained the second
highest number of Tehrani votes in the March-April 1996 legislative elections.
She is part of a new generation of modernist-Islamist women who, though not
feminist in the Western sense, are gender-conscious and have discovered politics
as an agent for radical change in women’s status. As controversial by-products
of the Islamic Republic, they are open to the outside world, and share a modern
reading of Islam which accounts for the wholesale societal change marking the
post-Islamist Iran. These women attempt to adapt Islam to the realities of a
society in which women’s social, economic and political activities have become
an integral part.

Islamist women’s collective
political involvement dates back to the revolutionary upheavals of 1978-79.
Their participation forced Khomeini to retract his previous stand and to endorse
women’s political rights as a religious duty. Evidence of this may be seen in
the following: Women have the right to intervene in politics. It is their
duty... Islam is a political religion. In Islam, everything, even prayer, is
political.[2] This shift marks a
significant change in Khomeini’s perception on women’s roles in comparison with
his position a decade and a half earlier, when the Shah’s decision to grant
voting rights to women in 1963 created scandal in Qum among the leading clergy.
Khomeini, the most vocal among them, had at that time criticized women’s
involvement in politics as an anti-Islamic measure: By granting voting rights to
women, the government has disregarded Islam and has caused anxiety among the
Ulama and other Muslims.[3]

It was indeed unimaginable for the
Ulama, who perceived women primarily as biological reproducers and
houseworkers, to conceive of them also as politicians. To make their point, they
referred to both the Islamic and the Constitutional Law of 1906: Women’s
entrance in the two Majlis (chamber of representatives and the senate), the
municipal and local councils, is against Islamic law... The granting of voting
rights to women and their election... is against the second article of the
amendment to the constitutional law... and abrogates the conditions Islam has
set on voters and the elect.[4]

The Revolutionary Period (1979-86)
and the Iraq-Iran War (1980-88)

In the immediate aftermath
of the revolution, the Family Protection Law of 1967 was abrogated and the
Islamic law implemented.[5] Thus, a series of
regressions were imposed on women’s rights in both the public and the private
realms: Islamic dress code was applied and the Islamic veil became compulsory,
initially for active women and then more generally among the female population;
important limitations were set for women in matters of divorce and child
custody; the minimum age of marriage for girls was lowered to nine years; and
women’s access to judiciary occupations was prohibited. At the same time, a
nation-wide campaign aimed at ‘purifying’ the public and private sectors of
secular women, or what Ayatollah Khomeini called ‘corrupt manifestations of the
monarchical regime and the West’,[6] was
orchestrated.[7]

In the words of one scholar
concerned with women’s affairs: Following the revolution, everything which
remained from the pre-revolutionary time was rejected... Under the pretext that
the West and its model is evil, women were dismissed from the administrative
system, and the home was considered the best and the most suitable place for
them ...[8] Yet, secular women
were not the sole targets of the traditionalist religious and political elite.
Some Islamist women activists soon realized that these regressions concerned all
women, regardless of their convictions. They thus engaged in social struggle
against the type of gender segregational policies outlined here: A series of
regressions were imposed on women’s rights, and even revolutionary [Islamist]
women were thrust aside. The authorities only needed us to demonstrate in the
streets but when the revolution triumphed they wanted to send us back to
domestic work. I then realized that revolutionary social activity was
meaningless when women were losing their rights, and started to defend women’s
rights’.[9]

Contrary to the traditionalist
clergy, Ayatollah Khomeini encouraged Islamist women’s activities in the public
sphere and criticized the opposition of the traditionalists. He said that ‘God
is satisfied with women’s great service, It is a sin to sabotage this [women’s
activity in the public sphere].[10] By endorsing
women’s political rights, however, and reiterating their political significance,
Khomeini intended to obtain their unconditional allegiance to the Islamic
regime. On the occasion of the referendum for the Islamic Republic he thus
affirmed that ‘all of you [women] should vote.

Vote for the Islamic
Republic. Not a word less, not a word more... You have priority over men’.[11] Indeed, he was
persuaded that women’s loyalty would inevitably draw the support of their male
family members for the regime. He added that ‘women have done more for the
movement than men, for their participation doubles the power of men. Men can’t
remain indifferent when women take part in the movement...[12] Thus, although
the application of the Shari’a entailed women losing their civil
rights,[13] they maintained
their political rights. While the civil code and the penal laws promote gender
inequality, men and women have equal political rights. For example, a woman’s
legal evidence is not accepted unless it is corroborated by that of a man,
whereas her vote is equal to a man’s vote. The Islamic Constitution reflects
this contradiction by attributing religious and judicial leadership exclusively
to men (articles 5, 107, 163), while remaining ambiguous on the issue of
political leadership (article 115). Indeed, the word rajul, which is used
in the latter article to define the prerequisite condition for assuming the post
of the President of the Republic, denotes both a man and a well-known
personality (which by definition can also be a woman).[14] As we shall see
later, this ambiguity has allowed modernist-Islamist women to argue that the
Constitutional Law authorizes women to run for presidential
elections.

Women Parliamentarians During the Iraq-Iran
War

The
Iraq-Iran War (1980-88), which for eight years mobilized the country’s
resources, was an impediment to the advancement of debate on the condition of
women. Despite the active participation of Islamist women in war efforts and
their recruitment by the pasdaran and the basij (volunteers), the
image of the true Muslim woman during the war years was strictly limited to that
of the mother and wife who sacrifices her sons and husband for the Islamic
cause. Both television and cinema played an important role in perpetuating state
ideology on women.[15] The plight of
Islamist women social activists was also overshadowed by the predominant values
of selfdenial, devotion and sacrifice, rooted in the Shi’a culture and
internalised by the young
volunteers. Indeed, their attempts to highlight the sufferings of women caused
by the overwhelming privileges granted to men by the Shari’a, were
afforded scant attention by the state-controlled media.

Moreover, the clerical and
political elite, who attributed all shortcomings and problems to the force of
circumstances, used the war as a pretext to dismiss women’s social problems, as
the following quotation demonstrates: During the war, the conditions for women
were alarming. Not only were they losing their rights but they were also faced
with immense social problems. Prostitution was increasing among the widows and
orphans who had lost the heads of their households in the war. But each time we
wanted to emphasize these social problems, the power elite restrained us under
the pretext that the country was at war.[16]

Indeed, during the war, the
government was devoid of specific economic, social, and cultural policies on
women, to the extent that ‘women had no place in the First Plan, implemented
during the war’.[17] The dominant
state ideology was also largely shared by male parliamentarians of the first,
second and third Majlis (parliament), convened respectively in 1979, 1983
and 1987. Women parliamentarians, on the other hand, who occupied 1.5% of the
seats in all three Majlis and defended ‘women’s Islamic needs and
rights’, were at a distinct disadvantage. Marziyyeh Dabbagh, who held
responsibilities during the war as the head of women volunteers (basij)
and the commander of the Pasdaran in Western Iran, affirms: in the second
and third Majlis, each time we [women] wished to present motions
[concerning the condition of women], we had to first talk to and persuade every
single male member, then we had to take the motion to the commissions to
convince the members of its validity before presenting it to the general
assembly. But even those who had already agreed with our propositions in a given
commission would, as a rule, vehemently oppose it once in the general assembly.
For example, I, Mrs Rajayi and Dastghiyb worked diligently to prepare a motion
relevant to women who had lost their heads of households.

We asked our brothers [male
members] what they wanted to do with these women. We argued that we could not
abandon them, and that the government should provide them with both material and
moral assistance. But our male colleagues responded to our request by saying
that each woman had a brother, a father or a son who should pay her alimony. We
negotiated with them for several months to no avail. Eventually the same motion
was passed by the fourth Majlis which was credited with its initiation.[18]

The majority of women
parliamentarians of the first to third Majlis came from established
religious families.[19] Gohar-al Shari’a
Dasteghayb and ‘Atiqih Rajayi (members of the first to third Majlis),
Marziyyeh Dabbagh (member of the second, third, and fifth Majlis), and
Maryam Behruzi (member of the first to fourth Majlis) were candidates of
the Islamic Republic Party and the traditionalist/conservative Tehran Society of
the Combatant Clergy. Maryam Behruzi, who was a preacher prior to her election,
leads the Ziynab Association, a politically influential religious group
for women, and an offshoot of the Tehran Society of the Combatant Clergy. As
fervent advocates of the rule of a jurisconsult (vilayat-i faqih), they
participate in the traditionalist/conservative religious networks, and, with the
exception of Dasteghayb who holds an MA in literature, they all have an
elementary and religious education.[20]

Despite their divergent views, they
shared some traits with their male counterparts. For instance, they all
concurred that ‘following the teachings of Islam, the Islamic Republic has been
attentive to women’s rights’.[21] Moreover,
although they were not opposed to women’s outside activities, they viewed women
primarily as houseworkers, child-bearers and childrearers. During this period,
most of their efforts were focused on preparing motions to defend more
adequately women’s Islamic rights in the private sphere of the family.[22] The divorce law
thus became one of the controversial issues of the first Majlis.[23] However, the
plight of employed women was largely overlooked until the foundation of the
Social-Cultural Council of Women and the Office of Women’s Affairs. The shortage
of day nurseries, kindergartens, and other child care facilities is one of the
main problems facing employed women, especially those with young
children.

Some
of them lobbied unsuccessfully to have additional nurseries created. Women
parliamentarians, however, were not mobilized to defend their cause. Maryam
Behruzi even told the press that nurseries were not suitable places for
children, and that children needed the presence of their mothers more than
anything else.[24]

Azam Taliqani, who was elected to
the first Majlis, differed from other omen parliamentarians. Contrary to
the latter, who mainly addressed omen’s issues, Taliqani was more preoccupied
with general political discussions, as she shows here: The first Majlis was unique in the Islamic Republic because different ideologies and
viewpoints were represented and confronted. While I actively participated in
heated debates along with my political allies, I had a rather individual
activity with regard to women’s issues.[25]

Daughter of the radical cleric,
Ayatollah Taliqani, she is a well-educated political activist who was a
political prisoner under the Shah. Although she was more concerned with the
promotion of her radical political stands than with women’s status, her quest
for social justice brought her into contact with the plight of women.[26] She thus combined
her gender sensitivity and political ambitions to found a political group called
Women’s Society, a research group called the Iranian Islamic Women’s Institute,
and to start publishing a magazine called Payam-i Hâjar in 1979. The
following is a brief account of her involvement in all this:

The idea of founding an
Islamist women’s organization goes back to when I was in prison. Back then I
realized that leftist women were better organized and could thus attract the
Islamist youth to their ideology. I was persuaded of our need for an
organization to serve women who had both legal and economic problems... After
the revolution, many women came to see us complaining about their condition.
Their grievances made us realize that our women had specific problems under the
new circumstances.[27]

It is worth pointing out that the
majority of these problems facing women had been initiated by the abrogation of
the Family Protection Law of 1967, and the implementation of a new civil code
based on the Islamic law in which overwhelming privileges had been granted to
men, particularly in matters of marriage, divorce and parental authority.
Therefore, Payam-I Hâjar addressed mainly family issues, and was the
first Islamist magazine to raise the question of the necessity for the
reinterpretation of Islamic laws.

For this purpose, Ayatollah
Taliqani’s teachings, popular among the Islamist left, were largely used. Azam
Taliqani is one of the rare vocal activists who continues to advocate social
justice by severely criticizing the consumerism of the elite, and the increasing
gap between the rich and the poor in postwar Iran. She believes that ‘wealth is
concentrated in the hands of a minority, including big merchants, while the
majority, that is the middle classes, have been impoverished. This is against
the very notion of Islamic justice’.[28] Likewise, in a
response to a question about women’s achievements in post-revolutionary Iran,
she bitterly told the press that ‘poverty and polygamy are the only things that
poor women have obtained from the revolution’.[29]

The
Post-war and the Post-Khomeini Era

With the end of the war in
1988, which the power elite had used as a pretext to justify all shortcomings, a
new age called the ‘period of reconstruction’ began. Economic, social and
demographic realities forced the power elite to adopt new strategies. For
example, the 1986 national census of the population--the first under the Islamic
Republic--revealed a population growth of about 15 million. Thus, despite the
pro-birth traditions of Islam and Iranian culture, and the traditionalist
Ulama’s disapproval, the government readopted family planning and birth
control from 1988 onwards.[30] The values of
devotion and self-denial, which dominated the previous period, began to weaken,
and the population, exasperated by the eight-year war, aired economic, social,
political and cultural demands. As a response, the government authorized a
relative freedom of press. Thanks to Hujat ul Islam Muhammad Khatami, the
liberal minded Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance (who was forced to
resign in July 1992), several hundred new journals and magazines, including
those for women, began to be published.[31]

Similarly, the scope of debates on
the condition of women expanded, and conferences started to be organized on
various aspects of women’s and family issues. In 1988, the High Council of
Cultural Revolution, chaired by President Rafsanjani, founded the Social and
Cultural Council of Women to promote women’s economic and social activity, and
in 1992 the Office of Women’s Affairs, an offshoot of the presidential bureau,
was created to ‘detect problems and shortcomings and to propose solutions to
ameliorate women’s status and their economic, social, cultural and political
role.[32] The emergence of
new types of female social and political activists with modern discourses and
agendas was yet another outcome of the post-war era and was tightly linked to
broader transformations.

New economic and social
policies were implemented to reconstruct the devastated infrastructures and to
reorganise the economy. Investment of foreign capital in Iran was encouraged,
and specialization (takhasus) and know-how gained increasing
importance.[33] The growing
significance of higher education and specialization is also reflected in the
composition of the ruling elite, especially cabinet ministers, who are becoming
increasingly better educated, though in terms of social and family origins they
still belong overwhelmingly to traditional middle and lower classes. In 1988,
93% of the cabinet members had received a university education, and 42% held
doctorates. Likewise, the proportion of highly educated Majlis deputies
increased from 10% in the second Majlis (1983) to 47% in the third Majlis (1987).[34] The biographical
data of a sample of 854 cabinet ministers, Majlis deputies, governors of
provinces and districts, mayors, Imams of Friday prayers, commanders of
the armed forces, directors of state agencies, highranking state cadres and
directors of revolutionary organizations, for instance, show that 537 (or 62%)
have a college degree, while 317 (38%) have a theological education.[35] Nonetheless, the
proportion of highly educated deputies decreased in the fourth Majlis (1992) in which traditionalists, most of whom had received a theological
education, predominated.[36] The proportion of
highly educated representatives increased sharply in the fifth Majlis (1996). Of the 249 elected deputies, 69% are university graduates: this
figure is made up of 35 PhDs, 42 MAs, and 94 BAs. From the remaining, 22 have a
high-school diploma or are university students, 4 have less than a high-school
diploma and 52 (or 21%) have theological education.[37]

The mounting importance of
specialists in post-war Iran and the consolidation of their positions also meant
the gradual thrusting aside of Hizbullah elements for whom devotion to
the Islamic system (nizam) and to the leadership of a jurisconsult is
more important than specialization.[38] Thus, if the
professional credentials of the political elite are likely to narrow the gap
between them and secular professionals--as illustrated in the support of the
latter for the pro-Rafsanjani faction, called the Representatives of the
Reconstruction of Iran, during the fifth Majlis elections--it has
simultaneously deepened the lack of understanding between them and the
Hizbullah.[39] In heated press
debates, the Hizbullah have accused the professional elite of adhering to
liberal and Westernoriented stands while the latter treat the former as
incapable and outmoded.[40]

Women’s
Participation in the Labour Force

In addition to the
increasing importance of the Islamic professionals, the implementation of
reconstruction policies also resulted in the return of secular women
professionals who had been dismissed from their posts during the revolutionary
period. Indeed, it was to recover the great shortage of professionals that the
power elite was forced to concede to their skills. [41]Firuzeh
Khal’atbari, a well-known economist at the Central Bank of Iran, said that ‘many
educated women, who had been “purified”, seized the opportunity to regain their
posts, while many others joined the professional activity for financial
reasons’.[42] Indeed, the
economic crisis of the post-war era has led to the decline in the real income of
urban households, the majority of which relied on a single source of income.[43] Women, whose
financial contribution proved essential, were thus compelled to participate in
the labour force. As a result, the representation of women in the economic arena
began to expand.[44]

As to the break down of women’s
participation in the labour force, I argue that it increased the revolution and the war, the
proportion of active women to the total female population had dropped sharply
from 10.8% in 1976-77 to 6.1%, it increased to 8.7% in 1991.[45] According to one
estimate, women’s participation in the labour force has tripled since 1986 to
attain 18% in 1993.[46] Nonetheless,
highly educated women are still one of the few categories of women to have been
reintegrated into the formal economy. The 1991 census data demonstrate that the
highest participation of women in the labour force (11 %) belongs to the
educated women in the age group 24-49, residing in urban areas.

Likewise, Marziyyeh Siddiqi
affirms that the highly educated constitute the bulk of active women.[47] It should be
noted that women’s employment rate as reflected in official statistics is quite
questionable: the data reflect legal participation of women in the labour force
mainly in urban areas. Rural women, the majority of whom work in family
enterprises, are categorized either as unpaid domestic workers or housewives.
Thus, according to official statistics, the proportion of active rural women to
the rural female population of ten years and above is 3.4%.[48] Moreover, the
labour participation in the underground economy, which overwhelmingly employs
less-educated women and has seen a remarkable increase of activity as a result
of economic crisis, is not reflected in the statistics.[49]

Women
Parliamentarians of the Post-war Era

The Fourth Majlis

Contrary to social and
economic spheres where specialization and know-how constitute sufficient
criteria for women’s participation, involvement in the political sphere
necessitates the allegiance to the regime and to its leadership. Yet, Islamist
women’s participation in the political sphere follows the general trend of
social and economic spheres. Indeed, despite the sweeping victory of
traditionalists in the fourth Majlis elections, convened in 1992, the
number of women doubled to reach a total of nine (or 3.3%). In addition to their
numerical increase, they were also more educated than their predecessors, some
were active as professionals prior to their election, and their average age was
lower (46 years as opposed to 55 for the previous women deputies). Moreover, for
the first time, four women were elected from the provinces: Akhtar Dirakhshandih
(high-school teacher) from Bakhtaran, Fakhrtaj Amirshaqaqi (BA in French
language and literature), and Fatimeh Humayun-muqadam (BA in planning and
educational management) from Tabriz, and Bibi Qudsiyyeh ‘Alavi (MD
gynaecologist, and surgeon) from Mashhad. The five women elected from Tehran
were candidates of the traditionalist/conservative right and included Maryam
Behruzi (elementary, religious education), Nafiseh Fayyazbakhsh (MA in Islamic
philosophy), Parvin Salihi (MA in mother and child health), Marziyyeh
Vahid-Dastjirdi (MD gynaecologist), and Munireh Nawbakht (MA in Islamic
philosophy).

The airing of demands by
the female population, the flourishing of debates on the condition of women in
women’s press, and the activities of the Office of Women’s Affairs and the
Social-Cultural Council of Women, encouraged some women deputies of the fourth
Majlis to address these issues, although not without reservations. Some,
more sensitive to women’s problems, presented amendments to articles of personal
status law and prepared motions ‘to fill the gaps’, accusing judicial
authorities of ‘the nonexecution of the existent laws beneficial to women.’[50] Nonetheless,
because they either adhered to the dominant ideology or did not want to be
marginalized in the Majlis, they refrained from criticizing the
traditionalist viewpoints which dominated the fourth Majlis.

One example is particularly
revealing. Influenced by the activities of the Office for Women’s Affairs which
had opened branches in the executive to evaluate and eventually meet the
problems of active women, Nafiseh Fayyazbakhsh and Munireh Nawbakht presented a
motion in January 1993 to create the Special Commission of Women’s Affairs.
Several male deputies, who refused to admit that women encountered specific
problems, spoke against the motion. They argued that Islamic laws granted full
rights to women, that women and men shared the same problems, and that if such a
motion were passed it would divide Muslims. Faced with this opposition, the
women deputies, with one exception, preferred to allow some of their male
colleagues who approved this motion to stand in their defence. This decision led
to an opponent deputy stating ironically that ‘because women [deputies]
preferred to delegate their power to men in the discussions relevant to this
motion, they would also prefer that the men take care of them.’[51] Maryam Behruzi
was the only woman who dared to make a speech, but instead of promoting the
motion, she deferred, affirming that ‘Islam has been sufficiently attentive to
women’s rights... We are fundamentally against the Western type of defence of
women’s rights... We do not wish for women to rise up against men. Following
Islam, we believe that men are protectors of women...[52]

The few initiatives of women
members of the fourth Majlis to improve the condition of women by
amending laws thus remained unfruitful. Moreover, their political ideology did
not correspond to the growing dissatisfaction of women with the existing laws
and the increasing social and economic activities of women.[53]

These
circumstances triggered an unprecedented mobilization of gender-conscious
Islamist women in the March-April 1996 legislative elections for the fifth Majlis. Many of the candidates
were known to the female population for defending women’s rights and promoting
the status of women. Often highly educated and vocal, they represent the new
generation of Islamist women technocrats whose ongoing interaction with the
Islamist state and an emerging civil society has led them to perceive politics
as a potent and necessary activity towards the acquisition of women’s rights.
During the electoral campaign, they disassociated themselves
from the previous women parliamentarians by criticizing their lack of
determination to tackle women’s problems. By so doing, they were responding to
the demands aired by the female population who seek change in the civil code, a
better access to women to employment opportunities, a better employment
legislation, and the reform of laws to promote women’s status in both the
private and the public spheres.[54]

Fatimeh
Rafsanjani, the President’s older daughter, the founder of Women’s Solidarity
Association, and the head of the Office of Women’s Affairs in the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs, thus maintained that ‘the fourth Majlis was not really preoccupied with women’s problems’. She also contended that
‘women’s rights are annihilated by the civil code, the courts and the society’,
and that ‘women’s social, educational and cultural problems cannot be resolved
as long as the number of conscious and active women remains slim in the Majlis’. She also pleaded that ‘half the seats of the
Islamic Majlis should be occupied by these women’.[55] Faizeh, her younger sister, while
running for the elections, maintained that ‘the fifth Majlis should resolve problems confronting women by
revising the civil code and facilitating their access to key posts in the
administrative and political institutions’. She argued that if women are given
equal opportunities, they are capable of running for the presidential
elections.[56]

Suhayla Jiludarzadeh, who for
years has served as the director of the employment and social and economic
affairs committee in the Social and Cultural Council of women, and who was
elected from Tehran, affirms: A woman deputy should be particularly aware of the
shortcomings and problems women are facing. As a woman, she should have an inner
determination to promote their status. For this very reason, I believe that half
of the deputies should be made up of thoughtful and specialist women who are
aware of women’s sufferings. In countries where women’s rights are respected, a
growing number of women are elected to the parliaments ...[57] Throughout the country, 305 women,
of whom the majority ran as independent candidates were mostly refused
qualification by the Council of Guardians (Shura-i
Nigahban).

In
Tehran, of a total of 419 candidates qualified by the Council of Guardians, 50
or 12% were women, among whom only 13 or 26% ran as candidates of the four major
factions, namely the Representatives of the Reconstruction of Iran (RRI, modern
right, close to President Rafsanjani), the Society of Combatant Clergy of Tehran
(SCCT, traditionalist right, close to Khaminehï and Natiq-Nuri, president of the
fourth and fifth Majlis and the candidate of the
traditionalist right for the forthcoming presidential elections), the Coalition
of the Line of Imam Groups (CLIG, Islamist left,
close to Musavi, the former Prime Minister), and the Society for the Defence of
the Values of the Islamic Revolution (SDVIR, traditionalist centre, led by Ray
Shahri).[58]

These factions contained some
candidates, yet among the ten women elected to the Majlis, Fatimeh Ramizanzadeh was the only joint
candidate of three factions (RRI, CLIG, and SDVIR); Marziyyeh Vahid Dastjirdi,
Nafiseh Fayyazbakhsh and Munireh Nawbakht were candidates of SCCT, and Faizeh
Rafsanjani and Suhayla Jiludarzadeh were candidates of the RRI. Provincial
candidates ran as independents, though some were endorsed by the leading
factions. This was particularly the case of Marziyyeh Siddiqi, elected from
Mashhad (the second largest city), who was supported by the four factions.
Marziyyeh Dabbagh from Hamedan, Shahrbanu Amani-Angineh from Urumiyyeh, and Bibi
Qodsiyyeh ‘Alavi from Mashhad were elected as independents. It should be noted
that two other women, namely Nayyireh Akhavan-Bitaraf from Isfahan (the third
largest city) and Ilaheh Rastgu from Malayir were elected during the first
round, and Pishgahifard from Isfahan won the second largest number of votes, but
the elections were nullified by the council of Guardians for no valid reason. A
total number of eight constituencies with several women candidates saw their
elections cancelled. As a result, the ten women elected constitute 4% of the
total deputies.

Although
Islamist women’s representation in the parliament remains slim, the five newly
elected women are more vocal, much younger (with an average age of 37.2), and
more experienced in women’s issues than their predecessors. In addition to their
political attitude, which is overwhelmingly modern and moderate, another
characteristic which they share is their passage from social to political
activity.

Shahrbanu
Amani-Angineh, a student in Public Management who encountered enormous problems
with the traditionalists during her campaign,[59] has been in charge of women’s mutual
aid and social affairs in Western Azarbayjan; Marziyyeh Siddiqi, who has an MA
in engineering from the United States, is one of the founders of the Office of
Women’s Affairs; Fatimeh Ramizanzadeh, who is an MD and a gynaecologist-surgeon,
has been in charge of family planning, public health and medical education in
the Ministry of Public Health; and Suhayla Jiludarzadeh, who has an MA in
engineering, has had important responsibilities in the Social-Cultural Council
of Women and the Office of Women’s Affairs. From a working-class background, she
has been active in promoting the conditions of workers and is the only woman
whose position is endorsed by the powerful Islamic Workers’ Association.

Faizeh
Rafsanjani, who has a BA in political science and physical science, is the
founder and the president of the Islamic Countries’ Solidarity Sport Council,
the vice-president of the National Olympic Committee, and a member of the
Islamic Republic’s High Council for Women’s Sport. In her own words, the reasons
which triggered her interest in women’s sports are that ‘sporting activities
have tremendous impact on women and prepare them for social activities. It
offers them the courage they need to get involved in the country’s affairs’. She
has recently gained extensive popularity among women, especially the youth, for
courageously defending women’s outdoor cycling. In fact, her forthright views
run contrary to the traditionalists whose opposition has politicized the issue:
Women’s outdoor cycling is neither illegal nor illicit ... It has become a
political issue because it was proposed during the legislative elections, and
those who opposed it bestowed a political dimension on it. After all, their
opposition was beneficial to outdoor cycling for now there is a significant
demand for it.[60]

The increased
participation of the young people in the fifth Majlis elections[61] was advantageous to these vocal
women because ‘for the younger generation, the younger a deputy, the better she
understands their problems.’[62] Faizeh Rafsanjani acknowledged the
importance of the young people’s support for her candidacy when she said that
‘my efforts to promote women’s sporting activities led the younger generation to
vote for me’. She is the only deputy who recognizes the specific problems faced
by young people, and claims to have conceived of a programme to improve their
condition. In her view, ‘despite the serious problems of young people, no one
talks about them. There is no commission in the Majlis to think about these issues’. Through her analysis, she implicitly
acknowledges the failure of the power elite to revolutionize and islamize this
new generation: Our younger generation was born after the revolution and is
devoid of revolutionary mentality. They were annexed to the revolution after its
victory. Although courses are taught at schools on the revolution, they are not
palpable for pupils and students who do not normally appreciate courses at
school anyway ... Western cultural invasion is a very serious threat to our
youth who are its main targets. If the younger generation, who are the future of
our country, are not raised to proper values, how can they run this country in
the future? To solve the problems of our youths, we should make them believe
that they are important for this country. For if they increase their
self-standing, they will no longer consume drugs, or watch satellite programmes
or listen to rap music and the like. We cannot force them by means of laws and
limitations. Not only will these laws fail to solve problems, but they will
increase them. Since the revolution our social problems are increasing
incessantly because they [the authorities] have wanted to solve them through
intimidation. Well, coercion and violence have had negative results.[63]

With regard to
her perception on women and women’s issues, she believes — contrary to her
sister Fatimeh, and to Suhayla Jiludarzadeh, who are in favour of a system of
quota for women — that: Women should attain scientific, technical, economic,
political, social and cultural status which they deserve by themselves. The
quota will have no positive results. On the contrary, it will make everybody
distrust women. Yet a woman who obtains a post owing to her proficiency will
undoubtedly leave a positive impact on society’s perception on women. With
reference to the persistent social and cultural barriers that hamper the
progress of women, some of which are created by women themselves, she argues
that cultural change in their mentality will follow with the increase in women’s
participation in the decision-making posts:

Women themselves often do not
trust other women... Well, I believe that active women are highly competent.
They are more motivated and can work more efficiently for women than men. One of
our major impediments is that despite the existence of a sufficient number of
women professionals, there is a lack of women’s representation in key posts
where macro politics and planning are decided ... Thus, if we manage to appoint
women specialists to relevant key posts, they can better defend women’s
rights’.[64]

Fatimeh
Ramizanzadeh intends to ‘reform laws in view of protecting women’s rights in the
family, at work and in society, and to erase men’s erroneous belief that they
are superior to women’.[65] Marziyyeh Siddiqi maintains that
women’s education and awareness should be promoted, cultural programmes should
be devised to eliminate false impressions of women, laws should be reformed to
promote women’s status and to solve women’s problems.[66] Siddiqi, who is also the director of
an international transportation company, agrees that the airing of demands by
the female population in the past few years has influenced women deputies of the
new Majlis who are now ‘far more vocal, courageous
and determined’ than their predecessors. She also detects a changing mentality
among the male deputies, whom she maintains have come to accept that women have
specific problems: Women deputies now have more courage and determination to
talk about shortcomings. An example of this courage is that for the first time
we all stood as candidates for various responsibilities in the Majlis. For the
first time in the Islamic Republic, several of us were elected members of
permanent commissions: reporters, secretaries, vice presidents; whereas in the
past a woman would have not dared to present her candidacy, and even if she did
she would not have been elected ... But now we consider ourselves equal to men,
and men vote for us because they trust our competence.[67]

The Impact of
Religious-Reformist Discourses on Women’s Activities

The period of reconstruction also
coincided with Khomeini’s death in June 1989, provoking the crisis of consensus
both at the societal level and among the religious and political elite on the
leadership of a jurisconsult (vali-yi faqih).
Indeed, Khaminehyi, the current leader, does not possess the necessary criteria
to assert his claim to authority. This lack of consensus has allowed the
emergence or the enforcement of modernist interpretations of Islam by some
religious intellectuals and clerics, including Abdulkarim Surush, a popular
philosophy professor, surnamed the Luther of the Iranian Islam.[68] Surush, who claims to be
anti-ideological (and therefore against political Islam) affirms that ‘we should
not give a superficial, official, rigid and final interpretation of religion
because religion is not an ideology ... If religion becomes ideology, it will be
reduced at best to jurisprudence’.[69]

Following the
constitutionalist cleric Mirza Muhammad Husayn Naïni (1860-1936),[70] these intellectuals and clerics
attempt to reconcile Islam with democracy, and to separate religion from the
state. Muhammad Mujtahid-Shabistari, a leading modernist cleric argues: A mujtahid [doctor in jurisprudence] can infer value
principles from the Qu’ran and traditions. [But] political system, institutions,
the functioning of the government, ... in short, everything which is relevant to
the political sphere, should be dealt with through reason and human sciences. In
this way boundaries are justifiably set.[71]

These
religious intellectuals and modernist clerics also maintain that political power
should acquire its legitimacy exclusively through founding its authority on the
public will. They admit that concepts of Western political thought have entered
Iran and have initiated significant change in the political culture of the
post-revolutionary Iranians who now aspire to economic, social, political and
cultural progress. In order to maintain this progress, they propose a synthesis
of Islamic traditions and Western modernity.

Their intellectual endeavours have
found tremendous support among educated Islamists, including gender-conscious
women, who rely upon these modernist views to advocate change. The following
statement by Shahla Shirkat, the editor in chief of Zanan, one of the leading women’s magazines, clearly
reveals this influence: Radical legal changes are needed to solve women’s
problems. Many articles of the civil code are based on the Shari’a, which must, therefore, be reinterpreted.
Moreover, women should be involved in this undertaking. Our understanding of
religion varies in each historical period, and religious interpretations should
account for factors of time and space ...

Referring to Surush’s works, she
affirms that ‘through their works, some religious intellectuals have posited the
necessity of radical reforms in religious thought. If they succeed, these
reforms will undoubtedly be expanded to women’s issues’.[72]

Women’s Press: A
Forum for Protest Social Activity

New Islamist women’s magazines,
especially Zanan and Farzaneh, to which secular women contribute, have begun
to be published. Despite their divergent views, an unprecedented gender
solidarity has emerged between secular and modernist-Islamist women, thus making
their alliance possible.[73] Mahbubeh Ummi, the editor of Farzaneh said the following: Although secular women do
not share our convictions, we can collaborate because we all work to promote
women’s status. We [Islamist women] no longer consider ourselves to be the sole
heirs of the revolution. We have realized that our sectarian views of the first
post-revolutionary years led to the isolation of many competent seculars, which
was to the detriment of all women. We now hope to compensate our errors.[74]

This view is
also shared by Shahla Shirkat, the editor of Zanan,
who said that ‘We should tolerate and respect each others’ convictions. Even
though we do not share the same philosophy, belief and thought, we can and
should work together’.[75] Mehrangiz Kar, a legal attorney,
Shirin ‘Ibadi, a jurist, Nahid Musavi, a journalist, and Zhaleh Shaditalab, a
sociology professor, are among secular women specialists who contribute to these
magazines. Through their writings and interviews, secular lawyers, economists,
sociologists, artists, historians, novelists, movie directors, etc. who are
denied the right to publish their own magazines, have seized the opportunity to
present their opinions and works and to raise demands for equal rights in the
private and the public spheres.[76]

The aim of
these magazines, which primarily attempt to reach both the educated women and
the political and religious elite, is to promote women’s status through
emphasizing legal, social and economic shortcomings, and to propose changes in
civil and penal laws, the employment legislation and constitutional law.[77] They manage to exert pressure on the
elite through civil society, especially through active women who have both
professional and family networks. Yet their editors unanimously maintain that
the inequality between men and women is not initiated by the Qu’ran, but rather
by the interpretations of religious authorities of the divine laws. They thus
argue that radical change in Islamic laws is essential. The editor in chief of
Zanan maintains that: The Qur’an has not banned
women from becoming a judge.

This prohibition was initiated in
the history of jurisprudence and in the opinions of the previous religious
authorities, whose ideas on women were probably shaped by the examples of their
own wives or female relatives whom they generalized to the entire female
population.’[78] In November-December 1992, shortly
after its publication, Zanan published a series of
articles in which the obstacles towards women’s authority in religious and
judiciary institutions were examined. It was maintained that none of the main
Islamic texts justify such prohibitions, that no consensus exists among
religious authorities on the issue, and that in the past, several women in Iran
and elsewhere in the Muslim world have reached the summit of religious
authority. The author thus concludes that ‘a man has no natural privilege over a
woman. If a man can become a judge so can a woman, and if a man can become a
source of imitation, so can a woman’.[79]

Mahbubeh Ummi
and Ma’sumeh Ibtikar, the editors of Farzaneh, hold
the same position: We support the equality of rights between men and women and
believe that according to the Qur’an, men and women are equal. We should make a
distinction between Islam and patriarchal traditions. Our laws are largely
founded on some unreliable hadith (remarks
attributed to the prophet), narrated by religious authorities. Several articles
of the civil code, including those concerning the right to divorce, guardianship
of children after divorce and those prohibiting women’s access to judiciary are
among them. Religious reformists examine the authenticity of these laws and
purify the civil code from spurious articles’.[80]

Since its
inauguration in Autumn 1993, Farzaneh has been
printing articles to illustrate the prophet’s high esteem for some women as
reflected in the Qur’an, and to highlight the political and religious roles that
some women played during his lifetime. Based on such evidence, the magazine
argues that an incompatibility exists between the Qur’an and existing religious
interpretations.

Zan-i Ruz, the only
women’s magazine which existed prior to the revolution and which continued
publication through changes in owner, board of editors and journalists, has
recently joined the general trend.

Although published by the
traditionalist/conservative Keyhan press company, Zan-i Ruz, which is popular among less educated women
for its cooking recipes, fashion, sewing and health care instructions, is being
transformed into a vocal magazine. Contrary to Zanan and Farzaneh, which primarily communicate with
the intelligentsia and the political elite, Zan-I Ruz, whose readers are ‘middle level women in terms of their education,
social and economic status’, reaches a wider public including men.

Tayyibeh Iskandari, the new
editor, is ‘determined to pose fundamental questions concerning the condition of
women’. She believes that ‘if we really intend to solve women’s problems we
should also reach men.’[81] Since the overwhelming majority of the decision makers are men, she, in common with editors of other women’s
magazines, includes increasing contributions from modernist clerics and
religious intellectuals, including Ayatollahs Yusif Sani’i and Bujnurdi, Hujat
al Islams Muhsin Sa’id Zadeh and Muhaqiq-Damad, and Husayn Mihrpur and Ahmad
Akuchakian. As specialists of Islamic law and jurisprudence, they attempt to
reinterpret the Shari’a with a view to implementing
change in the existing laws. It is interesting to note that political and
religious authorities, who are aware of the significant social impact of these
magazines, often respond to critical articles they publish. The office of
Ayatollah Yazdi, the head of the judiciary, for example, has, on several
occasions, reacted to articles published in Zanan and Zan-i Ruz which analyzed and criticized
legal shortcomings.

The
extent and multitude of queries by the female population has even led the Qum
religious seminary to publish a women’s magazine called Payam-i Zan to address these issues. Yet contrary to
other women’s magazines edited by women, the editorial board of Payam-i Zan is composed
exclusively of men. These debates, initiated by women’s magazines, have also had
an important impact on women political activists, including Faizeh Rafsanjani,
who maintains that ‘it is not Islam but the clergy’s interpretations of its
precepts which initiated the prohibition of women’s access to the judiciary’.[82]

Although
women’s magazines have managed to interact with the more moderate power elite,
they are also increasingly the subject of verbal attacks by the traditionalist
press, including Keyhan and Subh, and physical attacks by the Hizbullah mobs, backed by the traditionalist clergy.
The traditionalists protest against the gender-conscious women whom they call
‘Westernized feminists’. The defence of women’s rights is considered to be ‘an
attempt to annihilate Islam and the revolution through accommodating Western
cultural invasion’.[83]

What triggers the anger of the
traditionalists is that in addition to the demands for legal changes, these
magazines also publish views for and against the tchador (traditional Islamic veil), reports on women’s maltreatment by their
husbands, the dramatic stories of women who have been divorced without their
consent, those who could not obtain the guardianship of their children after
divorce, and salary and status disparities among men and women at work, for
example. These reports increase women’s awareness, and encourage them to be less
tolerant of the claim of superiority by their husbands or male family members.
They thus encourage women’s resistance against patriarchal traditions, which
consequently provokes conflict within the family institution. At the same time,
these magazines reach out to men and attempt to influence their attitudes
towards women. As Tayyibeh Iskandari argues, ‘although it is women who buy these
magazines, they take them home and their husbands read them too. A lot of men
contact us to criticize us for the articles we publish, but it also happens that
some make suggestions on how to improve the condition of women’.[84]

The
mobilization of vocal women who are social and political activists on the one
hand, and the demands uttered by the female population on the other, have led
some traditionalist women to join the general trend, thus contributing to the
polarization of the power elite into traditionalists and reformers. Munireh
Nawbakht, who, though a traditionalist, seems to be receptive to recent
transformations affirms that: the increasing social activity of women ...
necessitates radical reforms in the existing laws to determine women’s rights
and their social responsibilities... These issues should be discussed by the
majority of the deputies and this will only be possible if women are members of
different commissions ...’.[85]

Yet, some
others rebuke the modernist aspirations of their fellow Islamist women. For
instance, Maryam Behruzi severely criticized Faizeh Rafsanjani in public for
having promoted women’s outdoor cycling and horse riding, which she maintains
will assist the Western cultural invasion. Khaz’ali, member of the
Social-Cultural Council of Women, reprimands the editors of Farzaneh for their feminist stands as illustrated in
their articles published in a special issue of the magazine on the United
Nations’ Beijing Conference on Women in September 1995.[86] Likewise, Zanan is increasingly a subject of traditionalist
disapproval. The latter urges the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance to
retract its authorization to publish. Recently, a petition was launched by
Suraya Maknun, the chair of the women’s department in the Institute of Cultural
Studies and Humanities, who did not appreciate Zanan publishing her life story along with those of forty other renowned women
(most of them secular), in a special issue entitled “Women Talk About Men’s
Impact on Their Lives”.[87]

The Outcomes of
Women’s Struggles

The
obstacles towards implementing radical change in conditions for women are as
much intertwined with traditionalist impediments as they are with social,
cultural and legal ones. Yet during the past few years, women have successfully
lobbied for the modification of certain family laws to make it more difficult
for men to divorce their wives. To prevent unjustified divorces and to protect
divorced women, a new law called ujrat ul-misl was
recently passed which stipulates that when a man files for divorce his wife can
ask to be financially rewarded by her husband in return for the housework she
has carried out without her consent during the marriage. To file for divorce,
couples should now refer to civil courts which have recently been authorized to
hire women judicial counsellors. In January 1996, the ministry of justice
appointed 200 women judicial counsellors to preserve more satisfactorily women’s
rights in courts. Their appearance can be regarded as a first step toward
rehabilitating women judges in the judiciary. In fact, a conference was
organized in September 1996 to discuss the works of Ayatollah Muqadas-Ardibili
who issued a fatwa authorizing women to become
judges. Following this conference, Ayatollah Muhammad Yazdi, the head of the
judiciary, declared that ‘the question of the possibility for women to reoccupy
this post is under study’.[88]

Concomitantly,
and for the first time in the Islamic Republic, a woman was appointed the vice
director general of Tehran’s justice department. Likewise, a woman was appointed
vice minister (of public health). Marziyyeh Siddiqi estimates that several other
women will be imminently assigned to similar posts and that there will be a
woman cabinet minister in the future government.[89] In October 1996, the fifth Islamic Majlis approved a motion presented by women deputies
to create the Special Commission of Women’s and Family’s Affairs composed of
thirteen members, nine of which are women. This commission aims at reforming
laws to improve the protection of women’s rights. Moreover, some newly elected
women deputies, who argue that the dynamism of Islam should be reflected in the
civil code, propose that women be granted equal rights to divorce and that they
should obtain the exclusive guardianship of their children after divorce.[90] These propositions reflect the
determination of these modernist-Islamist women to respond to the demands of
female constituents.

Despite
traditionalist attempts to contain women’s awareness, the process which was
begun to construct women’s social identity is now irreversible. Today, both
secular and Islamist women reject the institutionalized inequalities and demand
a dynamic and adapted reading of Islam. Although seculars do not have access to
the political sphere, vocal Islamist women, increasingly backed by civil
society, are determined to implement conscious change through involvement in
politics. The Islamic state has thus no other choice but to accommodate the
participatory aspirations of moderate and modernist women whose partaking in
politics will undoubtedly implement democratic change in the political
system.

They are
protagonists of a change which encompasses the entire society. Under the present
circumstances where political Islam has demonstrated its limits, and the gap
between civil society and the state is ever widening, only the opening of
religion to modernity can avoid an ultimate rupture.

Acknowledgements: This paper was
originally published in the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 24,
No.1, 1997, pp. 75-96, and is reprinted with the permission of the author and
the publishers.

[3] From Khomeini’s telegram sent
to the Shah on 9 October 1962, in Sahifeh-i Nur. Vol. 22, p. 29.

[4] From Khomenei’s telegram sent
to A. ‘Alam, the then Prime Minister on 20 October 1962, in Sahifeh-i Nur, Vol. 22, p. 30 A similar telegram,
signed by nine highest ranking religions authorities was sent to ‘Alam in February-March 1963. They included Gulpayigani, Shari’atmadari, Zanjani, Tabatabai and Khomeini. See Sahifeh-i Nur, Vol. l, p. 29.

[5] For the Family Protection Law,
see among others, Ilehnaz Pakizegi, ‘Legal and Social Positions of Iranian Women’, in Lois Beck and Nikki Keddie (eds), Women in the Muslim World (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978), pp. 216-27.

[8] Zhaleh Shaditalab, a professor
of sociology at the Tehran University and a consultant to the Office of Women’s Affairs, interviewed by Firuzeh Sharifi, in ‘Muqi’iyyat-i zanan dar nizam-i idari-i Iran’, Zanan, I (February 1992), p. 7.

[9] Personal interview with an
Islamist activist who prefers to remain anonymous. Tehran. September 1994.

[23] For an in-depth account of
these debates, see Haleh Esfandiari. ‘The Majles and Women’s Issues in the
Islamic Republic of Iran’, in Mahnaz Afkhami and Erika Friedl (eds). In the Eye of the Storm: Women in Post-Revolutionary Iran (New York: Syracuse University Press, 1994).

[32] Personal interview with
Marziyyeh Siddiqi, member of the fifth Majlis elected from Mashhad, and one of the founders of the Office of Women’s
Affairs. Tehran, July 1996.

[33] Technical, technological and
scientific knowledge proved indispensable to the implementation of
reconstruction policies. Consequently, the government began to valorize
professionals, especially medical doctors, engineers, architects and economists.
The shortage of specialists even led the government to send envoys to persuade
the educated diaspora to return.

[34] Ahmad Ashraf, ‘Theocracy and
Charisma: New Men of Power in Iran’, International Journal of Politics, Culture and Society, 4 (1990), pp. 128-9.

[40] Keyhan, Risalat and Subh,
close to Ayatollah Khaminehyi, usually advocate devotion, while Ittila’at, Iran, Hamshahri, Akhbar and Bahman, who are close to the professional ruling elite, argue for the crucial significance of specialization in the period of reconstruction. The weekly Bahman, edited by Muhajirani, the Vice-President in parliamentarian and juridical affairs, was the most vocal organ of the Islamist-professional elite. It was forced by the Tehran Society of the Combatant Clergy to cease publication in April 1996 and its editor was tried.

[41] Professionals are usually
graduates of the higher educational institutes, and are composed of two groups: the salaried employees of the public and private sectors, and the liberal professionals. They include medical doctors, dentists, university professors, engineers, managers, technocrats, bureaucrats, and the like.

[44] Controversy exists among
specialists as to women’s participation in the labour force. For example,
Fatemeh E. Moghadam (‘Commoditization of Sexuality and Female Labor
Participation in Islam: Implications for Iran’, in In
the Eye of the Storm), argues that their participation is lower compared to
the pre-revolutionary Iran, while Val Moghadam (‘Women’s Employment Issues in
Contemporary Iran: Problems and Prospects in the 1990s’, Iranian Studies, 28 (1995), pp. 175-200), maintains
that official statistics show a higher participation.